In response to these developments, protest demonstrations of the young and idealistic sprang up around the world, waving placards and chanting slogans on the general theme of “save our planet now!” The best-selling T-shirt immediately become one showing Primo’s face. It was, as I explained to the puzzled saurians, much as expected.
Tertia had taken over my contact that day and was having some difficulty in understanding why humanity did not act sensibly when presented with a clear warning, but was instead trying to ignore and discredit it.
‘That’s the nature of humanity,’ I said. ‘The response to immediate threats is usually strong, but long-term dangers are harder to get people excited about and, if addressing them means short-term pain, most people will try to put off even recognising there’s a problem for as long as they possibly can.’
‘But don’t the mothers realise that they are ruining the world they will be leaving to their children and grandchildren?’
‘A lot do. You will note that most of the arguments against acting on your warnings come from men, and that isn’t only because more men are in positions of power and authority. Essentially, we haven’t just presented them with a problem; we have challenged their previous decisions and judgments and therefore their credibility. In their reactions to a long-term threat, politicians are no different from other people and typically try to avoid having to take hard and unpopular decisions, on the grounds that they are more likely to be voted out in the next election. Democracies are good at reflecting public opinion, much worse at leading it to where it really doesn’t want to go. How do you saurians deal with difficult decisions?’
‘This kind of situation hasn’t arisen. First because we usually do things very slowly, so there is plenty of time to give them careful consideration. Secondly because our mental abilities mean that we can evaluate the truth of scientists’ warnings for ourselves; other scientists can ask questions, pass judgement on the strength of the case being presented and relay their verdicts to everyone else. We still sometimes get scientists disagreeing about the interpretation of evidence collected, when this is not clear enough to reach firm conclusions, but in those cases our instinct as a race is to err on the side of caution. We don’t like to take any risks, particularly not with our environment. We have never seen the attraction of gambling.’
‘Is that just for practical reasons, or do you have a religious motivation? I’ve never asked you about your religions.’
‘We used to have a range of them, like yours but pursued rather less aggressively – nobody was ever killed because of them. They long ago evolved into a universal philosophy which we all agree on. It has some similarities with earlier human beliefs, such as were held by various native North American tribes, about the interconnectedness of all things; people, animals, plants and the natural environment in general. Unfortunately you lost that in the development of your major religions, and you are paying the price for it now. I should add that the alternate saurian worlds, whose people rejected the mental abilities we have, still have religions, but they have managed to avoid the worst of the problems the human worlds have.’
‘Do you believe in a creator, one all-powerful god?’
‘Oh no, that has no place in our beliefs. We have quite a clear understanding of the history of the Universe since the Big Bang, but no-one pretends to know what happened before that. Most scientists are inclined to favour the hypothesis of the cyclical Universe, constantly repeating, but the evidence is not clear enough to reach a firm conclusion.’
‘You have no concepts of sin or redemption?’
‘Wrong-doing, certainly. Inflicting harm on other people, or the wilful destruction of animals or plants, is regarded as unacceptable. In the distant past we used to be omnivores like humans, but for millennia we have eaten only fruit and nuts and drunk only water – I’m afraid you caught that from us. In fact, it is only the mentally unstable who would cause wilful harm, and we are able to detect such symptoms at a very early stage due to the emotions being projected. People may still sometimes cause accidental harm through carelessness, of course. They then have to do their best to make this good; we have a strong belief in individual responsibility for one’s actions.’
‘This doesn’t involve anything supernatural?’
‘Not in your terms, no. We believe that the aim of every individual should be to contribute more to society – in whatever way they can – than they take out, and the more they contribute the more highly they are regarded by everyone else. I think that the closest our beliefs come to your concept of the supernatural is our respect for our ancestors. No-one believes in ancestor worship, or that they are watching over us, but four times a year – at the equinoxes and solstices – we spend a day at home with our families, remembering our ancestors and pledging to honour their memories by the way we behave.’
I thought about the bizarre fixations of our religious fundamentalists and their sometimes appalling consequences, and sighed.
‘Tell me more about your alternate worlds. How many are there?’
‘Very few. Our scientists concerned with alternate worlds theory believe that although there is one force which causes the different worlds to branch off, there is an opposing force which acts to draw them together again. It is a bit like a shallow river with many small obstacles sticking up; the water parts to flow around them, then joins up again at the other side. They call this the “braided worlds” hypothesis. So the many minor changes which happen every day only create temporary “Stage 4” alternate worlds; they merge back again after a while. Only if the event which caused the worlds to diverge is significant enough – in other words, at Stage 3 – is the separation permanent.’
‘Doesn’t that cause all sorts of paradoxes? I mean, suppose a woman chose one husband in one Stage 4 world, and a different one in another? She would have different children, and a different family tree would be created which could run on indefinitely. How could they be merged together?’
‘That’s the main counter-argument, to which our scientists have not so far come up with a simple answer. All they will point to is the clear evidence that there are very few saurian worlds, whereas there otherwise ought to be an infinite number. For example, that there is no alternate saurian world like ours because once everyone is in mental communication, variations become very small. The Stage 3 variations are all concerned with those societies which rejected mental enhancement. Because they lack our global understanding, they have more variety in religious, social and political patterns. Even so, we have only been able to identify five other Stage 3 saurian worlds so far.’
I mulled that over for a while. ‘So there are likely to be many more human Stage 3 alternate worlds, given our diversity?’